sPWW. 




Glass 
Book. 




BRANSON L. HARRIS 
Age 90 



I 

SOME 
RECOLLECTIONS 
OF MY BOYHOOD 



BRANSON L. HARRIS 



E27 



ISSUED ON HIS 
NINETY-FIRST BIRTHDAY 






•H33 



THE HOLUNBECK PRESS, INDIANAPOL'3 






x 



SOME 

RECOLLECTIONS OF MY 

BOYHOOD DAYS 

At the request of my sons I here set down 
some recollections of my boyhood days. 
Although I am now ninety years of age I 
can remember many things in the long ago 
as clearly as ever. Of course, many things 
have passed from my mind. 



I begin by telling something of our f am- 
ily: 

I here give, as my Uncle Benjamin Har- 
ris gave to me, the nationality of my great- 
grandfather. His name was Obadiah Har- 
ris. He came from Wales. He was a very 
large man and weighed three hundred and 
twenty pounds. He came to the state of 
North Carolina in an early day and settled 
in Guilford county, somewhere near Bird's 
hatter shop and Dobson's cross-roads. He 

l 



RECOLLECTIONS 

was one of the charter members that built 
the New Garden meeting house. He was a 
Quaker preacher and lived there many years. 
My grandfather, Benjamin Harris, was 
born in Guilford county and lived there until 
his family was about grown. He moved to 
the territory of Indiana in 1807, and set- 
tled about six miles north of Richmond and 
four miles southeast from Fountain City. 
Soon after my grandfather came to this 
state my great-grandfather moved here from 
North Carolina; also, his younger son, who 
was a Quaker preacher, and settled near 
Fountain City, Wayne county, and there 
built a Quaker meeting house and gave it 
the name New Garden. 



II 



John Lewis, my mother's father, came 
from Randolph county, in the state of North 
Carolina, to the territory of Indiana in the 
year 1810 and settled in Wayne county, 
Green township, in the valley of Greens 
Fork, a little over a half mile south of Wil- 
liamsburg. He and his family were the first 

2 



RECOLLECTIONS 

settlers in Green township. I have heard him 
say that he knew of no white person then liv- 
ing either north or west of him. He and his 
descendants have lived on the same farm for 
nearly one hundred years. The nearest 
neighbor he had, except the Indians, was 
about six miles from where he had settled. 
His name was James Martindale, who lived 
six miles to the southwest. He came in 1809 
and bought a good tract of land where the 
town of Greens Fork is. Forty-one years 
ago I bought a part of this land and I am 
yet living on it, and I expect to live here the 
rest of my life. 

Ill 

I was born in Wayne county, Indiana, on 
April 21, 1817. MyTather, whose name was 
James, came from North Carolina with his 
father Benjamin Harris and a large family 
to the territory of Indiana in the year 1807. 
My father's age at that time was about six- 
teen. My father, who married Naomi Lewis, 
first settled three miles farther west on Mor- 
gan's creek. In about two or three years he 
sold out and entered one hundred and sixty 

3 



RECOLLECTIONS 

acres of land one mile southeast of Wil- 
liamsburg on the road leading to Richmond. 
On this land he put up a log cabin and 
moved into it. After living there eight or 
nine years father sold his farm and bought 
another, one mile and a half southwest of 
Williamsburg on Greens Fork. I was nine 
years old when he moved here. Father lived 
on the farm until his death. 



IV 



I now wish to go back to my earliest recol- 
lection and note down some things that I 
saw and heard. The first thing I will speak 
of is when I was very young, not more than 
four years old. I was out in the field with 
father where he was hoeing corn. As I recol- 
lect, it was a cloudy evening. All at once the 
wolves began to howl. I said, "Daddy, I 
want to go out in the woods where they are 
and see them." He said, "No, you can't go! 
They would kill you and eat you up." When 
he told me they would kill me and eat me 
up, this satisfied my curiosity. In those days 
some persons built wolf traps about six feet 

4 



RECOLLECTIONS 

square out of small logs or poles. When 
they got the pen about five or six feet high, 
it was drawn in like building a stick and clay 
chimney, leaving a hole at the top, then 
baited inside with fresh meat. The wolf 
jumps in at the top. When in, it can't jump 
out. 

Father very often would take his gun and 
go out hunting early in the morning while 
the frost was on, and often before nine 
o'clock he would come in with a deer on his 
back; or, if he had killed one that was too 
heavy to carry, he would take a horse and 
sled and haul it home, then dress and cut it 
up, and we would have some fresh venison. 
And often he would send me with pieces of 
venison to some of our nearest neighbors. 
Sometimes when he would go hunting he 
would bring in a turkey or a pheasant or 
two. At that time there was plenty of wild 
game. In the winter or early in the spring 
I have often seen deer in our wheat field 
eating the green wheat. The bear was not 
to be seen very often; occasionally some 
neighbor would kill one. 



RECOLLECTIONS 



Father and mother's early home was a 
plain hewed log cabin one story high, clap- 
board roof, a door on each side of the house, 
round poles for joists, one glass window, a 
plank floor pegged down, loose plank floor 
overhead, stick and clay chimney, with a pole 
run across up above the jambs, high enough 
so it wouldn't catch fire, to hang cooking ves- 
sels and kettles on. Mother's cooking vessels 
were, a pot, an oven, a skillet, an iron tea- 
kettle and a johnnycake board. She cooked 
over and before the fire. The oven and skil- 
let had iron lids. She baked corn pone and 
loaf in the oven, biscuit and pies in the skil- 
let. She shoveled the fire coals out on the 
hearth, set the cooking vessels on the coals, 
put in dough, put on the lid and fire on the 
lid and baked. She hung the vessels over the 
fire to boil meat, potatoes, cabbage, and other 
things. Our food was simple, but whole- 
some. We drank milk, and spicebrush and 
sassafras tea. (I have seen tea made of red 
sycamore chips.) It was a long while before 
coffee and tea came into use. Every one 



RECOLLECTIONS 

made his own sugar and molasses in the 
spring. 

VI 

The first mill that I recollect of was what 
was called a "tread-wheel mill." I can tell 
but very little how it was built. This much I 
recollect; the machinery was propelled by 
the weight and the moving forward of the 
horses. There was a round platform placed 
a little above ground, some fifty to eighty 
feet in circumference. The horses were 
placed upon the platform at a certain place, 
tied by the halter. When the horses step for- 
ward, that sets the platform to moving in its 
circle. The machinery that does the grind- 
ing is attached to that. They only ground 
corn. I have no recollection of ever seeing 
but one. The mill was three miles from 
where father lived, on the road we went 
when going to see Grandfather Harris. This 
corn-cracker was on Nolens Fork, three 
miles east of where we lived. 

The first lumber I ever saw was whip- 
sawed, and this was not very common. The 
way they arranged to do the sawing was as 

7 



RECOLLECTIONS 

follows : The first thing to do was to build a 
scaffold by setting four forks in the ground 
some six feet apart one way, and twelve or 
fourteen the other way. The forks would 
have to stand above ground some feet and 
then two skids were laid across for the log to 
rest on. The logs that I saw them sawing 
were five or six feet above ground. The log 
was hewed square, and when it was put upon 
the scaffold it required two men at least to 
do the sawing. One man stands upon the 
log, the other man stands directly beneath. 
Then they pulled and pushed the saw up and 
down. This whipsaw mill was built near-by 
the tread-wheel mill. 

As far back as I can recollect it was quite 
a task to go to mill to get the wheat and corn 
ground. There were no mills near that made 
good flour. There were but few mills in the 
country. These few were run by water. 
There were times in the year when the water 
was very low and they could do but little 
grinding in a day. They would have to stop 
grinding until they could gather a head of 
water. Then they could start up again and 
grind a short time. A great many persons 



RECOLLECTIONS 

would hitch to their wagons and take a load 
of grain to mill for themselves and neigh- 
bors, and very frequently there would be so 
many loads in ahead of them they would 
have to wait a day or more for their turn to 
get their grain ground. The distance that 
some families would have to go to get to 
mills that had a bolting-cloth and run by 
water power was from ten to thirty miles. 
Sometimes it would take two days to go to 
mill. The two mills that I knew of were 
Newman's at Richmond, and Goodlander's 
on Greens Fork, from fifteen to twenty-five 
miles down the creek. I also knew of one 
mill that was run by water in the north part 
of Wayne county that ground wheat and 
corn. Grinding wheat was very tedious 
and tiresome. The bolting frame had to be 
turned by hand with a crank like a grind- 
stone or a coffee mill. When I got large 
enough to go to mill father would put a 
bushel and a half in a sack and throw it 
across a horse's back. Then I would get on 
the sack and ride to the mill. I would stand 
on a box to be high enough to reach the crank 
so I could turn the bolting cloth. 

9 



RECOLLECTIONS 



VII 

The first school I ever went to was in a 
small log cabin, clapboard roof, stick and 
clay chimney. The cabin was on my grand- 
father's land, not far from where Williams- 
burg is now. The first book I had to take to 
school was the "A B C," as we called them, 
and "a, b, ab's" printed on a piece of paper 
about three or four inches wide and pasted 
on a board with a handle made in this shape : 



IS 



We had no intermission. The schoolmas- 
ter kept books from eight o'clock in the 
morning till half past eleven ; and from one 
o'clock until four or five o'clock in the even- 
ing. The children were seated upon slab 
benches. I had to go about one mile to school 
through the woods. 

10 



RECOLLECTIONS 

The first three or four schoolhouses that I 
attended were built of small logs with clap- 
board roof. The top log at each end of the 
house was about four feet longer than the 
other end logs in order to make an eave to 
the house. They would get a nice little pop- 
lar tree or gray ash that would split straight 
and split it in two, take one-half and put on 
one side of the house and the other half on 
the other side of the house on the ends of 
those logs that projected from the corners 
of the house and edge them up to keep the 
clapboards from sliding off, then they would 
put on a big pole lengthwise on the house. 
These poles were called ribs. Then put on 
another end log at each end of the house 
just long enough to hold the ribs, then slope 
the ends off so the boards could be put on; 
and so continue till they got the house ribbed, 
then the house is ready for roofing. The first 
course of boards were laid on the top log of 
the house and the next rib; then they would 
take a pole, not quite as large as they laid 
the roof on, and lay on the boards to hold 
them from sliding or blowing off. They also 
would have to take two or three short pieces 

11 



RECOLLECTIONS 

of split timber (called knees) and lay up and 
down on the boards between the top poles to 
keep them from sliding or rolling off. They 
were called weight poles. And so continue 
laying course after course until the house 
was completely roofed. They then would 
chunk and daub the house with clay or mud, 
build a stick and clay chimney, cut out a log, 
most commonly on the north side of the 
house, put little sticks up and down between 
the logs a few inches apart and paste paper 
on the sticks, then grease the paper. This 
was to give light. On the south side was the 
door. On the right side as you went in was a 
glass window where the teacher sat with 
chair and table. There was a large fireplace 
inside. The floor was made of puncheons. 
We had slab benches to sit on with no backs 
to them. In cold weather when our feet got 
cold we would ask the master to let us go to 
the fire to warm them. 

If any of the scholars misbehaved he 
would call us up to his seat, question us, and 
whip us, if he thought we deserved it. If he 
thought whipping was too severe punish- 
ment he would have us sit on the dunce block, 

12 



RECOLLECTIONS 

or weave "sole leather," and let the scholars 
laugh at us while we shot the shuttle through 
under our knees from side to side, as we 
would raise our bodies by putting our hands 
on the floor and raising ourselves a little. 
Then we had to bump, bump, then shoot the 
shuttle back and bump, bump again until he 
said, "That will do." All teachers were not 
guilty of punishing in that way, but I saw it 
in more than one school. I went to one school 
where the teacher would punish scholars with 
a ferrule he had to rule our copybooks. He 
would take hold of the fingers and straight- 
en out the hand and strike the boy across the 
palm of the hand, which was a severe pun- 
ishment. All the masters that I went to un- 
til I was fourteen or fifteen years old kept 
a pretty long switch in the schoolhouse. In 
some of the schools that I went to the schol- 
ars studied out loud. The books used when 
I went to school were a Primer, Webster's 
Spelling-Book, the Introduction, or Eng- 
lish Reader, and an American Reader, and 
Adams' Geography. Our writing table was 
on one side of the house where the paper 
window was. They bored holes in the logs 

13 



RECOLLECTIONS 

just below the window, put in wooden pins 
and placed a broad plank on the pins for a 
writing desk. Some of the schoolmasters 
after books was called would let the scholars 
study their lessons awhile. Then when all 
had said their lessons, he would say to those 
who were learning to write: "Come and get 
your copybooks and go and write." Not 
more than three lines at a time did he allow 
them to write. And when they were seated 
at the writing table he would come and show 
them how to hold the pen and to shape and 
make letters, and so forth. We said four 
lessons every day; two in the forenoon and 
two in the afternoon. He would say: "Lay 
down your books and get the spelling les- 
son." After we had studied the lesson a few 
minutes he would say: "Put away your 
books and get ready to spell." We would 
form in line and he would give out the lesson 
to us word by word, and we tried to see who 
could get ahead. When one missed spelling 
a word the one below spelled the word. He 
went above him, or as many as missed spell- 
ing the word given out by the master. If the 
word was given out to the one who was at 

14 



RECOLLECTIONS 

head and was misspelled by every one in the 
class on down to the foot of the class, and he 
who stood foot spelled the word right, he, 
by spelling the word, turned them all down 
and went up head at once. 

We went to the springs for water. At 
some springs we would dip the water up 
with a gourd and fill the wooden bucket to 
carry to the school-house for the scholars to 
drink. We sometimes, on Christmas, turned 
out the master to make him treat us to two 
bushels of apples. If he refused we would 
carry him to the branch to duck him; but 
just before we would get to the branch he 
would say: "Let me down, boys, I will 
treat." And then he would send for apples, 
and we would have a holiday feast. In later 
times the teacher would sometimes treat to 
licorice and candy. 

Spelling-schools in time were common 
through the country in different neighbor- 
hoods. The schools at the different districts 
would set a time to have a spelling-school, 
then give out word and invite other schools. 
We didn't try to see which school could beat 
spelling. Either two boys or two girls as 

15 



RECOLLECTIONS 

captains would choose up, taking choice 
about. When all were chosen we then would 
spell to see which side would beat. The 
school teacher would keep order and give 
out for the scholars to spell. Whenever a 
scholar missed spelling a word he sat down. 
When the teacher commenced giving out, 
the side that got the first choice would be 
given the first word to spell ; then next to the 
other side, and so on alternately from side 
to side; and as one missed spelling a word 
he sat down until all on both sides were 
seated. 

Some of the young people almost knew 
by heart the spelling-books or small diction- 
ary commonly used. Frequently we had 
spelling-schools on Sunday afternoons. 

In the early time, when I was a boy, 
there were but few singing-schools. I recol- 
lect of one man teaching singing-school, and 
I wanted to go but my father objected. He 
said it was a place for the rowdies to gather 
and cut up. Father still had Quaker blood 
flowing in his veins, although he married out 
of that church. I have heard my grand- 
mother Harris object bitterly to congrega- 

16 



RECOLLECTIONS 

tional singing in church. My younger 
brothers took the matter in their own hands 
and went to singing-school and became good 
singers. I often regret that I didn't do as 
my two brothers did. I might have been 
much more useful in the church than I am. 

VIII 

At the time father lived on the road south- 
east of Williamsburg it was known by the 
name of Johnson's Mill. Many a time when 
out along the road I have been asked, "How 
far is it to Johnson's Mill?" by men who 
were traveling. At that time there were a 
great many men going west and north to 
enter land to make homes for themselves 
and their children. At that day the only way 
of traveling was to go afoot or on horse- 
back, more especially when exploring a new 
country. Men who were out looking for land 
to enter for homes often called at father's 
to stay over night. Most generally there 
would be two men together. When they got 
their horses put away they would come car- 
rying their saddle-bags to the house and 

17 



RECOLLECTIONS 

throw them under the bed where they were 
to sleep. That was the only lock and key 
there was about the house. They carried 
their silver in their saddle-bags. 



IX 



The high land seemed to grow all kinds 
of timber more than the bottom lands 
along the water courses. We had a great 
variety, such as yellow poplar, white oak, 
bur-oak, pin-oak, black oak, gray and blue 
ash, hickory, black and white walnut, maple, 
beech, and red oak, wild cherry, sugar-tree, 
sycamore, buckeye, black gum, and a great 
variety of undergrowth of various kinds. 
On the bottom lands the principal growth 
was sycamore, black walnut, white or hick- 
ory elm, some shell-bark hickory, blue ash, 
some white and bur-oak, and buckeye, and 
sugar-tree. The woods as a general thing 
were very thick set with underbrush, such as 
spicewood, ironwood and hazel bush and 
other kinds. Now, to keep from getting lost, 
especially the women and children, the men 
would have to cut and blaze out a trail, 

18 



RECOLLECTIONS 

sometimes called a path, through the woods 
to and from each one of the neighbor's 
houses as they would go back and forth to 
borrow from and visit each other. Roads for 
several years after they were cut out through 
the woods were in many places very bad in 
crossing branches, and black, flat, wet land 
soon became miry so they would have to 
build corduroys. We would cut poles and 
logs and split timber and lay the same 
across the road in many places wherever the 
ground was low and wet, and sometimes 
throw some dirt on the logs so it wouldn't 
be quite so rough to pass over. Sometimes 
the bridge would be ten or fifteen rods long 
in marshy ground. It would be some time 
after a road was opened before the roots and 
stumps would rot out so we could plow and 
grade the road. It took a great deal of work 
to make and keep roads so they could be 
traveled. It was a long time before the peo- 
ple learned to make turnpikes. 



19 



RECOLLECTIONS 

X 

My first visit to Indianapolis was made 
when I was about twelve years old. My 
father and mother and my younger brother 
Winston and myself went out to Indianapo- 
lis to visit my Uncle Obadiah Harris, my 
father's brother, who lived two miles west of 
that town. We went in a two-horse wagon. 
The road had recently been chopped and 
grubbed out. West of Knightstown most of 
the road was very bad. There were a good 
many places that had become miry. People 
who were going west had to cut out byroads 
sometimes for half a mile or more to get 
around those bad mud holes. So one day 
Winston and I concluded we would take it 
afoot along the main road, as the wagon was 
to go the by-road. We went on and kept 
looking for them until we became alarmed 
and scared. Winston commenced crying. 
We turned back. They became alarmed and 
halloed for us, but we failed to hear them. 
Father left mother with the team and came 
running back to see what had become of us. 
We met him where he left the road and took 

20 



RECOLLECTIONS 

the byway. We stayed with the wagon from 
that on. We camped out one night on the 
bank of a creek, fed the horses and ate our 
supper out in the lonely, thick forest, and 
slept in the wagon during the night. In the 
morning, as soon as mother could get break- 
fast, we ate and started on. The big black 
horseflies were so bad father had to spread 
quilts over the horses' backs to keep them 
off. It looked like they would almost eat 
the horses up. We stopped and fed and ate 
dinner somewhere between Greenfield and 
Indianapolis, I can't now tell just where. I 
recollect very well what I thought. I 
thought it a very wet, flat country. The land 
along there don't look to me like it did then. 
The capital of the state was no great city at 
that time. The better part of the town was 
along Washington street, not far this side of 
the river. There was no bridge at Indianap- 
olis, and we drove north and crossed Fall 
creek somewhere above the mouth and went 
up White river to where there was a ford 
and crossed over and got on the National 
road again. It was but a short distance to 



21 



RECOLLECTIONS 

Uncle Obadiah's after we got on the Na- 
tional road. 

My father and his brother had married 
two sisters, daughters of John Lewis, and 
the families were always very much attached 
to each other. 

When we drove up in front of Uncle 
Obadiah's house on the south side of the Na- 
tional road, my mother leaped from the 
wagon into her sister's arms and all cried 
with joy. This scene I will never forget. 

XI 

When father commenced clearing the 
farm southeast of Williamsburg he, like the 
rest of his neighbors, had no way to haul 
anything. People were too poor to own a 
wagon. They had to make sleds before they 
could do any hauling of any kind, such as 
hauling rails to build fences or getting wood 
for fires in the house. 

They made and used what they called rail 
sleds some ten feet long. They would make 
boxes something like a wagon bed and put 
on the sled to gather their corn in, and they 



RECOLLECTIONS 

would take hickory withes and some straight 
poles and bind the poles and sled together 
with the withes in some certain way, so they 
could load on their hay and wheat and haul 
it to the barn or stack. I have helped my 
father haul a good many crops of hay and 
wheat on the sled with this kind of a rig. 

We had what we called log-sleds. They 
were very low near the hind end of the sled. 
This sled we used to haul saw logs to the 
sawmill when there was snow on the ground. 
We would roll one end of the log on the sled 
and chain it to the bench of the sled and let 
the other end drag on the snow. We often 
put four horses to the sled. In the winter we 
would in this way haul up great long logs 
to the house for firewood; then we would 
have to chop it before and after we got home 
from school — enough to do day and night. 
The woodpile stood in the weather; no one 
thought of a wood-house or of cutting wood 
except from day to day at the log pile in 
front of the house. 

It was one of the duties of a boy to keep 
enough wood cut to keep up the fires. Green 
buckeye logs were the favorite for backlogs, 

23 



RECOLLECTIONS 

as they would hardly burn at all. Then a 
big forestick laid on two stones or dogirons 
and smaller wood between. There are no 
such fires any more. 

As well as I recollect there were no 
wagons made in this county for some time. 
My father had a man to make for him the 
woodwork of a wagon, a crooked-rail bed 
(they were called Virginia beds) ; the lock 
was fastened to the bottom rail of the bed. 
Father sent to Cincinnati for the iron and 
steel to iron the wagon. The people who 
moved here from the southern states had 
crooked-bed wagons. Families who came 
here from New Jersey and the eastern states 
had plank box beds most commonly. 

I have already told about all I remember 
about wagons. I do recollect of seeing one 
of a different make from any that I have al- 
ready described. I think there were but few 
of them made and used in this county. A 
man living west of my father had the one 
that I saw. I suppose he made it. The 
wheels were sawed off of a log from two to 
three feet through — perhaps a black gum. 
It is very hard to split. They were turned 

24 



RECOLLECTIONS 

out for the spindle of the axle to go through. 
Perhaps the wheels were hooped with iron. 
He worked oxen to the wagon. It was a 
four-wheel wagon, and quite a clumsy ve- 
hicle. 

There were no threshing machines of any 
kind. I can recollect seeing father thresh 
his wheat on the ground. Before threshing 
he would take his hoe and scalp off a spot of 
earth and pack it with his maul and make 
it as smooth and level as a brickyard. There 
he would thresh out his wheat with a flail, 
what little he had. Then he would get two 
of his neighbors to help him clean the wheat. 
At that time there were no fans. Then the 
two men would use a bed sheet, or a piece of 
woven flax or tow linen, a man at each end of 
the sheet; then by a quick revolving motion 
they would create wind enough to separate 
the chaff from the wheat. The third man, 
with a half bushel or basket filled with wheat 
in the chaff, would stand in front of the two 
men holding the sheet, pouring it out very 
slowly, while the other two men by the quick 
revolving motion of the sheet would raise 



25 



RECOLLECTIONS 

wind enough to separate the chaff from the 
grain. 

XII 

In the early days men had log rollings in 
the fall and winter, and at all odd times 
would clear the land. When the timber 
was green they would chop it down with 
an ax, pile the brush and cut up the bodies of 
the trees in proper lengths for rolling. Men 
who had deadenings would in a dry time, 
especially in the fall of the year, cut or burn 
down trees. Those that wouldn't burn up as 
they lay we would "nigger off" with fire, as 
we usually term it, in proper lengths to pile 
in log heaps. I was at log rollings from the 
time of my first recollection every year until 
I was grown. At the first log rolling I re- 
member I was not large enough to do any- 
thing except to carry the water and whisky 
that they always had in those days. Some- 
times they would appoint two men as cap- 
tains to divide the ground, then the two 
captains would divide the men by choosing 
man about, then they would have a race to 
see which side could beat. I helped the 

26 



RECOLLECTIONS 

neighbors roll logs from the time I was large 
enough until after I became a man grown. 
I helped ten to fifteen days almost every 
spring or fall. We helped each other till we 
got done. We kept no account of time. The 
big heavy logs, those that were too heavy 
for men to carry, we would roll together, 
some six or eight or ten or more ; then carry 
and pile on top as long as you could get them 
to lie on, making log heaps. When the logs 
didn't lie up high enough from the ground 
for the men to get their handspikes under the 
logs, then they would lay their handspikes on 
the ground and roll the log on the spikes. 
Then very often it would take as many men 
as could stand on each side of the log to lift it 
and walk with it to the log heap. And oc- 
casionally there would be a log too heavy to 
carry and we would have to lay skids and roll 
it on the log heap. It took men of nerve and 
backbone to undergo such heavy work day 
after day for two or three weeks at a stretch. 
Yet the most of the people appeared to en- 
joy it. They were looking ahead for a better 
time to come in the future. 

At the first log rollings I went to, for din- 
27 



RECOLLECTIONS 

ner they would have boiled ham or roasted 
meat of some kind, cooked potatoes and tur- 
nips, sometimes parsnips, corn pone, biscuit, 
and sometimes loaf, dried apple pie, or dried 
pumpkin pie, or dried peach pie, coffee and 
tea of some kind, milk and butter, and dried 
venison, whisky and egg-nog. Women of 
the neighborhood would come in and help to 
do the cooking and washing dishes, and 
sometimes, too, have a quilting. The women 
as well as the men would have a good jolly 
time. It was the same way at house and 
barn raisings. The men and women would 
turn out and help. It appears to me the peo- 
ple in those days at these gatherings enjoyed 
themselves quite as well as men and women 
do nowadays at their social parties. 

House and barn raising was another 
heavy and laborious work we had to do. We 
would chop down the trees, then score and 
hew the logs, then drag them on what we 
called a "lizard" through the woods to the 
place where they wanted to build the house 
or barn. We would saddle up a horse if we 
had one, and ride all over the neighborhood 
asking the neighbors to come on a certain 

28 



RECOLLECTIONS 

day and help raise the building; and as many 
as could to bring their wives with them to 
help do the cooking. Usually they would 
have a good jolly time. The people would 
turn out almost to a man to help to put up 
the building and perhaps roof it on the same 
day with a clapboard roof. 

XIII 

Long, long ago, when the country was 
thinly settled, wild pigeons were very 
plenty. Some times in the year they were 
more plenty than at other times. About six 
miles north from where we lived was a 
pigeon roost. It was in a large scope of 
woods. Early in the morning they com- 
menced going south. They would continue 
flying in large droves for some time. Then 
again in the evening they flew back north 
to their place of roosting. They went in 
such large droves that I may say in the 
course of the day there would be hundreds 
of thousands fly over every day where we 
lived. They hatched and raised their young 
at their roosting place. I said they flew 

29 



RECOLLECTIONS 

south. I suppose they flew in every direction 
from their place of roosting. 

Great flocks would settle in the fields after 
the country was cleared up some, and then 
the drove would move forward in this way: 
the hindmost would half jump, half fly to 
the front, as they fed. Boys often set traps 
for them. A trap was made of small limbs, 
or pieces of split boards, bound together 
hard and fast. It could be carried easily. A 
trigger was set under one side of the trap 
and wheat or oats or corn scattered around 
and under the trap. If a bird, being under, 
touched the trigger, the trap fell. Some- 
times six or more would be caught at once. 
Quail were trapped in the same way. 

In the early times the squirrels for some 
years became so numerous and destructive to 
the growing crops that the farmers made 
hunting matches to see if they could by do- 
ing so save their grain from being so badly 
destroyed. They would set a day to hunt. 
Every farmer would take his rifle and go on 
the day set to go hunting (there was a 
premium given to the man who killed the 
most squirrels ) , and every man was to bring 

30 



RECOLLECTIONS 

in the scalp of every squirrel that he killed. 
In the evening of the same day they would 
meet and count and see, and the man who 
had the largest number of scalps took the 
premium. In the spring of the year, after 
we got the corn planted and as soon as it be- 
gan to come up, the squirrels and wild 
pigeons would commence taking it up. I, as 
well as other boys, would have to go around 
the fields in the mornings with our dogs 
halloing and yelling, making all the noise 
we could to scare the squirrels out of the 
fields, and also in the evening. I had what 
was called a horse-fiddle. When I put it in 
motion it would make a noise like a team of 
horses running away with an empty wagon 
over a rough, frozen mud road. It was of 
more value in scaring the squirrels out of the 
cornfields than anything else. 

XIV 

The only way we had to cut wheat or oats 
for a good many years after my first recol- 
lection was with a sickle, or reap -hook, as 
they were sometimes called. The neighbors 

31 



RECOLLECTIONS 

would help one another cut their wheat. 
They would notify each other when their 
wheat would do to cut. Some one of the 
men would be what they called a leader. He 
would start in first; when he had cut about 
four feet the second man would start in, and 
so on until every man had his place. They 
aimed for each man to cut the same width. 
When we could we marked our ground in 
lands so many feet wide, just enough for 
two men to cut. By that means each man 
would know just what was his portion to cut. 
When they reaped through to the other side 
of the field they would carry their sickles 
over their shoulders and bind up the wheat 
into sheaves as they walked back to where 
they began, and as a boy I would be there 
with a bucket of water and a bottle of 
whisky. They said they must take a little 
whisky to keep the water from hurting them. 
Carrying the water and the whisky was the 
boy's work in harvesting. After a few years' 
time the scythe and the cradle took the place 
of the reap-hook, except in down grain, 
where we always had to use the sickle. I 
never could do very much in the way of cut- 



RECOLLECTIONS 

ting wheat with a sickle. But I didn't like 
to be beaten in cutting wheat with a cradle ; I 
mean in cutting a level stubble and laying 
the grain nice and straight for the binder to 
take up, who follows behind. We mowed 
the meadows with scythes. Frequently the 
hay lay in swaths until next day. Then we 
would spread it over the ground and let it 
lie until it became dry. We would rake it 
into windrows with hand-rakes, then load it 
on the sled or wagon and haul it to the barn 
or stack. Before we had barn room for hay 
we cocked up the hay out of the windrows 
and let it stand until the cocks settled. It 
stacked much better. Before I was large 
enough to pitch I would take a grape vine 
and put it round the cock of hay close down 
to the ground and fasten the two ends to- 
gether around the cock. Then I would hitch 
a horse to the vine and drag the cock on the 
ground to the place where they were stack- 
ing it. I could haul it as fast as two men 
could stack. There was very little wasting, 
and it saved work and stacked better. 

Corn huskings came late in the fall when 
corn became perfectly dry. Farmers would, 

33 



RECOLLECTIONS 

many of them at least, pull their corn in- 
stead of shucking it on the stalk, haul it to 
where they wanted it, throw it out on the 
ground, in a long nice row; they would in- 
vite their neighbors and friends to come 
some evening to the corn shucking, and as 
many as could to bring their wives to help 
do the cooking. The men and boys would 
string all along one side of the pile of corn 
to shuck, and as they shucked it they would 
throw the ears over on the other side and put 
the shucks behind them. While husking 
they would sing songs and tell long-winded 
tales and pass the bottle around. One thing 
I can say, I never knew a man to become in- 
toxicated — I mean drunk — at any gathering 
that the farmers had to help one another, 
either log rolling, house or barn raising, har- 
vesting, corn shucking and so forth. When 
the shucks were put away, then all were in- 
vited to the house to eat supper; when sup- 
per was over and the dishes washed and put 
away, at some houses, the bottle would be set 
out on the table, also a glass of water and a 
sugar bowl. All were invited to the table, 
and as many as wished would go and take a 

34 



RECOLLECTIONS 

drink. Then all the men and women would 
go to their homes. 

XV 

I well recollect when it was nothing un- 
common to see a company of Indians pass 
by. There was an Indian village or two in 
Henry county; also over in Ohio there were 
Indian towns. In passing back and forth 
from these towns they passed our house. 
They also had a camping place near the 
creek, about one mile west from where we 
lived. Sometimes they would stay there a 
day or two. I recollect going with father to 
where they were in camp and seeing some of 
their cooking vessels and how they hung up 
their pots to boil their meat, and also their 
pack-saddles and ponies whereby they car- 
ried their tents and things as they went 
from place to place. An Indian man and his 
squaw and boy stayed at our house all night 
two or three times when passing by. I and 
the boy would play together as though we 
belonged to the same tribe. Sometimes there 
would be three or four Indians stop at 
father's to get something to eat. I recollect 



RECOLLECTIONS 

on one occasion some time in the forepart of 
the day there were four Indian men called 
at father's to get something to eat. It so 
happened mother had a fresh warm pone 
baked, and cold boiled meat, and butter and 
milk. She set these out on the table and 
asked them to come up to the table. They ate 
heartily. When they went out they stopped 
and pointed up towards heaven, then pointed 
towards mother and said something in their 
own language. Mother said it was asking 
God to bless her for her kindness. 

I and the little boy when out playing 
would go to the sheep house (we had to put 
our sheep up at night to keep the wolves 
from killing them) and run our hands 
through the cracks and catch them by the 
wool to make them jump. At night when 
the boy would go to sleep they would wrap 
him up in a blanket and lay him on the floor 
under the table. They would wrap them- 
selves in blankets and lie on the floor before 
the fire. 

The Indians were plenty in this part of 
the country when my grandfather settled in 
the woods. He and grandmother were old- 

36 



RECOLLECTIONS 

fashioned Quakers. I used to hear it said 
that grandmother never turned an Indian 
away who asked for something to eat, and 
that during the time of the war with the In- 
dians, in about 1812, they used to tell grand- 
father not to be afraid, for they would not 
hurt him or any of his family. 

Indians would treat white men very kind- 
ly when they would go to where they were 
camped; if they had their meal about ready 
they would ask you to stay and eat with 
them, and when done eating they would 
light their pipes and ask you to take a smoke 
with them. They took it as a mark or sign 
of friendship. If you refused to eat and 
smoke with them they would regard it as an 
insult and think you were no friend of theirs 
and didn't like Indians. 

I well recollect meeting four Indian 
squaws in the road. Each one was on a pony. 
Indian women, like men, ride astride of the 
pony's back. Two of the squaws were car- 
rying babies. Each baby, or papoose, as they 
called them, had a board about its length 
tied or buckled on its back to hold it straight 
and fast to the board, then the baby was tied 

37 



RECOLLECTIONS 

fast to its mother with their backs together; 
then the mother would jump astride of a 
pony and away they would go. I don't re- 
member very well how the Indian women 
dressed. The men wore buckskin pants. They 
wore an odd garment they called a hunting 
shirt, caps made of different kinds of skins, 
and on their feet moccasins made of buck- 
skin. 

XVI 

When I was about ten years old my 
father sold his farm southeast of Williams- 
burg and bought another farm on Greens 
Fork, a mile and a half southwest of Wil- 
liamsburg, and moved on it. Father and 
mother lived there during the rest of their 
lifetime. Here father and his boys cleared 
out a farm of very heavily timbered land and 
put up buildings ; and we gave our attention 
somewhat to raising hogs. At that time 
there was, comparatively speaking, little 
land inclosed. In the summer and fall of 
the year, usually, all the stock a man had, 
including his sheep and hogs, were turned 
outside to the woods. For a good many 



RECOLLECTIONS 

years the young cattle and sheep seemed to 
do well. Hogs would do without much feed. 
And in the fall of the year, when there was 
plenty of nuts and acorns, hogs would get 
fat without being fed on corn. Sometimes 
some would get as wild as deer. I well recol- 
lect father had seven head that became very 
wild. Some time in the forepart of winter, 
when there was snow on the ground, father 
got his neighbors to come and bring their 
dogs to help him catch his hogs. In the 
morning, when the men all got there, they 
went out into the woods where the hogs were, 
taking the dogs with them, and as fast as 
they could be caught they would knock them 
in the head and stick them. They finally 
caught them all. Then they hitched two 
horses to a rail sled and drove into the woods 
after them, brought them in, dressed them, 
cut them up and salted them down for our 
meat. 

For a number of years after the new- 
comers began to move to Wayne county, 
everybody had to put a mark on all their 
stock, except their horses, in order that they 
could know their own stock from their 

39 



RECOLLECTIONS 

neighbors', as the most of them had to turn 
out into the woods for some years. In fact, 
the farmers marked their stock for a good 
many years after I began to farm for my- 
self. The mark was in the ear, and usually 
we had our marks recorded at the county 
seat. The reason why: if two men had the 
same mark and should claim the same hog or 
steer or sheep, and should go to law, if one 
of the men had failed to have his mark re- 
corded the man who had recorded would be 
entitled to the animal. Some may wonder 
how we marked so that no two men would 
have the same mark that lived in the same 
neighborhood. As said, they marked alto- 
gether in the ear. These are the marks gen- 
erally used : 

A square crop off the point of the right 
ear is B'smark. 

C's mark is a square crop off the left ear. 

D's mark is a half crop off the right ear. 

E's mark is a half crop off the left ear. 

F's mark is a swallow fork in the right 
ear. 

G's mark is a swallow fork in the left ear. 

H's mark is a swallow fork in both ears. 

40 



RECOLLECTIONS 

I's mark is one under bit in right ear. 

J's is two under bits in right ear. 

K's is one under bit in left ear. 

L's is two under bits in left ear. 

M's a round hole in right ear. 

N'sa round hole in left ear. 

Horses, as a general thing, were better 
than the cattle or hogs. A good many of the 
horses were of pretty good stock and size. 
The country demanded some large, heavy 
horses, as bad as the roads were, to do the 
heavy hauling that had to be done to get the 
produce to market. Smaller and cheaper 
quality of horses would do to work on the 
farm, which were most common to be used 
for general purposes. The cattle were rather 
small and rough and some of them heavy- 
horned. Some of the cows were good for 
milk and butter, but not for beef. Hogs 
that we had when I was ten or twelve years 
old were what we called "sang-diggers," 
long legs and nose, long bristles, poor feed- 
ers. They were small, and weighed 200 to 
250, sometimes 300 pounds. 



41 



RECOLLECTIONS 

XVII 

Our early orchards were seedlings. The 
trees were neither budded nor grafted, but 
trees that grew from the seed; some of the 
trees would bear large, good apples. Some 
trees would have sour apples. There was no 
telling when you set out an apple tree what 
kind of an apple it would bear. The early 
orchards generally were good bearers, but a 
majority of the fruit was not worth much 
except for cider and vinegar. The peach 
trees would grow almost anywhere, and live 
and bear peaches for a good many years 
before they would decay and break down. 
It was no trouble to raise peaches. I recol- 
lect when father would send me to the or- 
chard to pick up the peaches by the bushel 
and feed them to the hogs. That was before 
he had learned to build dry-kilns or dry- 
houses to dry fruit in. Father first built a 
dry-kiln to dry apples and peaches in. He 
soon built a dry-house; then we could dry 
fruit by the bushel. We then quit feeding 
peaches and apples to the hogs. 

In early times, when this part of the state 

42 



RECOLLECTIONS 

was very thinly settled, farmers depended 
more on raising a crop of corn and feeding 
it to hogs to make a living then anything 
else they could do. There was little demand 
for wheat. New land wouldn't produce 
wheat very well, not like it would corn. I 
can recollect when corn sold as low as ten 
cents a bushel, although it was not usually 
that low. Wheat, if I recollect correctly, 
sold for thirty-one and one-fourth cents, 
and up as high as forty cents per bushel. I 
do very well recollect when I sold wheat at 
fifty cents per bushel, and at that day it was 
considered a very big price. In those early 
days, if we raised from ten to twelve bushels 
of wheat to the acre, we thought we were 
doing well; and sometimes it had the rust. 
The flour then made was but a very small 
quantity to the bushel, and poor at that. 
The mills were old-fashioned and clumsy, 
and much of the flour went off with the bran 
and shorts. Sometimes the women would 
run flour or meal through a fine wire sieve 
before making bread. 

From the time I was twelve to fourteen 
years old until we had railroads in this coun- 

43 



RECOLLECTIONS 

try, the people had poor markets. Until we 
had railroads we had to take our teams and 
haul to market all of our surplus produce, 
except our hogs, which we drove on foot. 
When it came to driving hogs to Cincin- 
nati it was a labor which a great many had 
to do, although I never did, though I have 
driven my own, and helped some of my 
neighbors quite a number of times to drive 
to Eaton and New Paris, Ohio. After Reid, 
Beler, Venamon & Smith built a pork and 
slaughter house at Richmond I sold my hogs 
to them until they quit packing pork. I now 
wish to state what a change there has been 
in the minds of men in regard to raising 
hogs. Way back as far as the year 1850 the 
larger the hog the more money he would 
bring per hundred pounds. Anywhere with- 
in ten or twelve miles from Richmond, some 
of the farmers got up a strife, and I was 
one of them, who wanted to see who could 
raise and feed of his own raising a lot of 
hogs which when well fattened would make 
the heaviest average per head. In the year 
1855, 1 fattened a lot of my own raising and 



44 



RECOLLECTIONS 

feeding of sixty-seven head that made an 
average of 487 pounds, net. 

There were a good many farmers in those 
days that fed hogs of their own raising that 
would net over 400 pounds. The reason why 
I speak of the weight of hogs that the farm- 
ers raised in those days is to let it be known 
what a change there has been in the minds 
not only of the farmers but of the people 
also. I will speak of one lot more of one 
man's raising and feeding, then I am done. 
I went into the state of Ohio on purpose to 
see them, and to buy a pig. They were a lot 
of thirty head as pretty white hogs as I ever 
laid my eyes on; they made an average of 
500 pounds net. 

XVIII 

In an early day, as far back as my mem- 
ory serves me, up until I was nearly grown, 
the farmers' wives spun and wove and made 
clothing for all the family. For summer we 
wore clothing made of flax or tow linen. 
Every farmer would sow from one -fourth 
to an acre in flax. When ripe they would 
pull it by hand. As they pulled it they would 

45 



RECOLLECTIONS 

spread it in straight rows or swaths, and let 
it lie until it was cured and dry, then bind 
it up in sheaves, being careful to keep it 
straight, then haul it to the barn and thrash 
off the seed, then take it to a clean grass lot 
or meadow and spread it out very thin to let 
it rot; when the straw becomes tender and 
brittle they finally bind it up and put it into 
the barn. In the winter we broke the flax. 
It took men to do that. Boys could do the 
swingling the flax. Many a day I had to 
stay at home from school when a boy to 
swingle flax to get it ready for mother to 
spin. The women would first have to hackel 
the flax to get out what was called tow. The 
tow they would spin and weave into linen, to 
make our summer pantaloons, and the flax 
they would spin and weave to make our sum- 
mer shirts. The women also made a great 
deal of their summer clothing of flax and 
cotton yarn. They would buy the raw cotton 
and take their hand cards and card it into 
rolls and then spin it, and then dye it any 
color they wished, and weave it striped or 
checked as they liked. They also made their 
winter clothes, as well as ours, of wool. As 

46 



RECOLLECTIONS 

soon as the sheep were sheared in the spring 
we would wash the wool. People would fre- 
quently ask their neighbor women and girls 
to come to the wool picking. Then in the 
evenings the young men would come, too, 
and all would have what we called in those 
days a frolic. Then the wool would be sent 
to the carding machine to be carded into 
rolls. The women then would spin it into 
yarn; then color the yarn in any color they 
should fancy or admire: blue, brown, red, 
and so on, with walnut bark or madder or 
indigo. Then they would spool it, warp it, 
then put it in the loom and through the 
gears, then through the reeds. The women 
then can go to weaving it if they have a little 
spinning wheel to quill the thread and a 
shuttle to shoot the thread back and forth 
through the warp on the loom. The wool 
was generally spun by the girls and younger 
women. They spun the wool on a big wheel. 
They would have to walk back and forward 
on the floor four to six steps to draw out the 
thread in order to give it the proper amount 
of twist. The older women could sit by the 
side of the little wheel and spin flax and tow 

47 



RECOLLECTIONS 

by the use of the foot upon the treadle to 
turn the wheel. My dear wife spun the wool, 
flax, and tow, for many years to make our 
clothing. I have helped my mother often 
when I was but a small boy put the warp 
on the beam of the loom. When the warp 
was wound up around the beam, we would 
put the thread of the warp through the gears 
and reeds of the loom. The warp was called 
the chain. We would take a pair of winding 
blades and a spinning wheel, put the skeins 
on the winding blades, then spool it on little 
spools about three inches long, then the little 
spools, or "quills," as we called them, were 
put on the spindle of the little wheel; then 
the yarn, which was called "filling," was 
wound around the quills as full as they 
would hold ; the quills were then ready to be 
put into the shuttle. Then the weaver would 
take her seat in the loom and the shuttle in 
the hand and her feet upon the treadle of 
the loom and go to weaving cloth. I have 
filled quills many a day for my mother when 
she was weaving. 



48 



RECOLLECTIONS 

XIX 

I will here give the kind of farming and 
agricultural implements we had for some 
years after I became large enough to com- 
mence plowing. We had breaking plows and 
two kinds of corn plows. We had a two- 
horse wooden moldboard, bar share plow, to 
break up the ground for corn, and a one- 
horse bar share plow of the same make to 
plow corn; also a single-shovel plow to plow 
corn, and a one-horse iron-tooth harrow to 
use in cultivating corn and putting in wheat 
or corn. Some men would break up their 
newly-cleared rooty ground with a two- 
horse big shovel plow. The plow would have 
an iron colter morticed through the beam of 
the plow, and the point of the colter fastened 
at or near the point of the plow to keep the 
plow from getting fast under the roots. It 
would run right over the roots and drop into 
the ground again. It was pretty well calcu- 
lated to root up the ground where it was 
very rooty. Land that had just been cleared, 
while the timber was yet green when first 
plowed, could not be harrowed on account 

49 



RECOLLECTIONS 

of so many green roots. In fact, in that day 
but few farmers had a two-horse harrow. 
We would cut a big heavy brush and hitch 
two horses to it and drag it over the plowed 
ground in the place of a harrow. It an- 
swered the purpose of a harrow pretty well. 
We also put in oats, flax and wheat the same 
way. 

In a few years after the timber had been 
cut off, when the ground was plowed, the 
roots would break into pieces so the ground 
could be harrowed and put in order for 
planting corn or sowing in wheat. Iron- 
tooth harrows were not very plenty. A good 
many farmers had to use wooden-tooth har- 
rows who were not able to buy spike harrows. 
We cultivated our corn with a one-horse 
wooden moldboard bar share plow and a sin- 
gle-shovel plow. And some farmers plowed 
their corn when it was very small with what 
they called a "bull tongue" not wider than 
your hand. These were the only kinds of 
farming implements that we had to tend 
corn with for a good many years, except the 
hoe. Some men hoed their corn every time 
they plowed it. Most of the corn had to have 

50 



RECOLLECTIONS 

one regular good hoeing before the corn was 
laid by, and the weeds pulled out of the hill, 
and then hilled up with the hoe. 

For a good many years, while the culti- 
vated land was fresh and very productive, 
before we began to raise red clover, it be- 
came very weedy and well seeded with Span- 
ish needles; more especially the low, black, 
rich land. A good many farmers, before 
they went into their fields to gather their 
corn, would go to the woods and get a brush 
that would go between the rows of corn 
without breaking the corn down, then hitch 
a horse to it and put a boy on the horse and 
put him to work brushing down the weeds. 
These are some of the ways of farming in 
the early settling of Wayne county that I 
and many other boys had to do. 

XX 

Before there were any canals or railroads 
in eastern Indiana most of the surplus prod- 
uce of Wayne county (and surrounding 
counties) had to be hauled by wagon and 
team to Cincinnati or Hamilton, Ohio. 

51 



RECOLLECTIONS 

Wheat and flour and the country produce 
that the storekeepers would take in exchange 
for their dry goods and groceries, such as 
bacon, lard, eggs, butter, dried fruit, etc., 
the merchants would market in this way. 
The farmers had teams to haul the mer- 
chant's stuff to and from Cincinnati, and 
the storekeepers would pay them for haul- 
ing in dry goods and groceries, which was a 
great help to farmers in paying off their 
own store bills. At that day there were but 
few men who could within themselves rig 
out a full team. My father had a large 
four-horse wagon and two good wheel horses 
and a near neighbor had two very good 
horses that worked well in the lead. So be- 
tween the two they got up a very good four- 
horse team. The neighbor, Mr. Veal, de- 
lighted in being on the road with a team. 
He was ready when there was any hauling 
for the merchants. My father was not a 
good teamster, and I at that time was too 
young to go on the road with a team. Fa- 
ther made an arrangement with Mr. Veal 
for me to go along with him and to take care 
of the team when on the road. For two or 

52 



RECOLLECTIONS 

three years after father and Mr. Veal rigged 
up a team I went to and from Cincinnati 
with Mr. Veal with the team after harvest 
till cold weather. We took our provisions 
with us, and most of the time took horse 
feed, too. 

We camped out at night and slept in 
our wagon. Often there would be from two 
to four teams fall in together. In those days 
there were more or less deep mud holes. We 
frequently would mire down, and then we 
would have to double team and get some 
poles or rails and pry up and pull out, and 
sometimes help pull each other up steep or 
long muddy hills. We went a few times in 
the winter. We then put up with men along 
the road who had prepared for entertainment 
and had plenty of stable room and feed for 
horses, and wagon yards. We had our bed- 
ding with us and slept on the floor before a 
fire in order to save expenses. Our beds 
were two or three quilts. Sometimes two 
men slept together. The last trip I made 
with Mr. Veal with our partnership team 
was in the dead of winter with a six-horse 
team. Before we got to Cincinnati the 

53 



RECOLLECTIONS 

weather became warm and rainy, and when 
there it took all day to unload, and gather up 
our load to take back with us. It was nearly 
dark when we got loaded. We then had to 
go about one mile to where we could stay 
all night. We had driven but a little way 
when the off lead-horse became scared at the 
ringing of the auction bells. He crowded 
the line horse up against the sidewalk. I 
had to get down out of the wagon and go 
and take the horse by the bridle and hold 
him back in the street so Mr. Veal could 
keep the team on the street. Wagoners in 
those days drove their four-, five-, or six- 
horse teams with a single line. The driver 
would ride on the near wheel-horse and use 
the line and whip. I got muddy to my knees 
wading through the slush and mud by the 
time we got to the wagon yard where we 
could stay all night. Next morning it was 
still warm and rainy and foggy. The roads 
were not thawed near through. The mud 
was not deep. The roads were a perfect 
"loblolly." I don't know any better word to 
describe it. The four lead horses before 
night became totally covered with mud. It 

54 



RECOLLECTIONS 

turned cold in the afternoon and froze up 
solid. That night we could not untie the 
horses' tails. Next morning everything was 
frozen up pretty solid. Our wagons stood 
about felloe deep in the mud in the evening 
and were frozen fast in the morning. We 
had to take mattock and old axes and dig 
and chop the wagon wheels loose before we 
could pull out of the wagon yard. Another 
such day's teaming as we had during that 
entire day I never experienced before or 
since. The road we went that day had a 
good many low places where the water stood 
and had frozen over. On account of a bridge 
washing out we had to go on a different 
road part of the way home. There was no 
other team ahead of us. We frequently 
would have to stop and break the ice before 
we could cross the sloughs and small streams 
where water had settled down from under 
the ice. The weather remained severely cold 
until we got home. This trip to Cincinnati 
satisfied my ambition for teaming. It took 
us ten days to make the trip. 



55 



RECOLLECTIONS 

XXI 

The young men of to-day, as soon as they 
get old enough to go out in company, must 
have a horse and buggy. To this I do not ob- 
ject. It is all right. When I was but a lad 
the boys and girls, when they went any- 
where, usually went afoot. A good many 
boys as well as the girls had no horse to ride. 
When a boy could furnish himself with a 
horse, saddle and bridle, he felt himself 
pretty well equipped. I well recollect when 
the girls as well as the boys frequently had 
to walk. And sometimes when the nights 
were light the boys and girls would get to- 
gether, living two or three miles from 
church, and foot it there and back home 
without a murmur. It was the best they 
could do in those days, and they enjoyed it 
as well as the young do now. The young 
people often had parties. The married peo- 
ple would have wood choppings, flax pull- 
ings, and apple cuttings and quiltings and 
ask the young men and women to come in 
and help them. At night they could have 
their frolic. I was one of the boys who en- 
56 



RECOLLECTIONS 

joyed going to those parties and taking an 
active part in our sport and amusement as 
well as any one. 

XXII 

The first meeting that I recollect ever at- 
tending was at my Grandfather Lewis'. 
There were no meeting-houses anywhere 
near until some time after my first recollec- 
tion. My Grandfather Lewis had a large 
hewed-log house. Occasionally there would 
be preaching at his house. Father lived 
within a mile. Whenever there was a meet- 
ing father and mother would go and take 
the family with them. There were three men 
that I heard preach there — Samuel Boyd, a 
Newlight, Jerry Swofford, a Baptist, and a 
man by the name of Hockett, also a Baptist. 
In the course of a few years some Metho- 
dists moved into the neighborhood and built 
a log meeting-house near Williamsburg. In 
a few years after the Baptists built a meet- 
ing-house two or three miles north of Wil- 
liamsburg and organized. 

The Quakers had meeting-houses at 
Richmond and New Garden; and later in 
57 



RECOLLECTIONS 

other parts of the county. But they were 
too far away for me to attend regularly 
when I was a boy. Besides my mother was 
not a Quaker, and so we did not belong to 
the Society of Friends. 

The first Quaker meeting that I recollect 
of going to was at Chester meeting-house, 
three or four miles north of Richmond. In 
the early settling of the county of Wayne 
there were more Quaker churches than any 
other one denomination. The Quakers were 
noted for settling down in neighborhoods, 
and it soon enabled them to erect meeting- 
houses and form societies. This is one reason 
why there were more Quaker churches and 
Quakers, too, perhaps, than any other re- 
ligious denomination. When at grandfa- 
ther's my Grandmother Harris would take 
me up behind her on "Old Rock" Wednes- 
day, the fourth day, and go to Chester and 
attend meeting. Then as soon as the Friends 
had assembled the leader, or head man of the 
church, would say, it is time for meeting, 
then all would go in and be seated. They 
would remain on their seats for an hour, and 
oh, how tired I would be sitting on a slab 

58 



RECOLLECTIONS 

bench with no back to it, and my feet 
wouldn't reach the floor ! How tired I would 
get! And all this time not a word would be 
said; all kept perfectly silent. 

XXIII 

In early times there were some stores in 
the country. I never knew but one country 
store. That was about four miles east of 
where we lived. The store was owned by a 
man named John Baldwin. I have heard my 
mother say she traded there some, and paid 
as high as twenty-five cents per yard for blue 
calico. This was when I was not very large. 
In a few years there was a store at Williams- 
burg. In those days money was scarce and 
hard to get. Many farmers had to manage 
as well they could and sell butter, eggs, 
feathers, rags and chickens — anything they 
raised that they had to spare, to get on. They 
would have their boys out digging ginseng. 
It brought a good price per pound. The 
storekeeper would take in exchange for his 
goods the farmer truck that I have above 
spoken of. The farmer would buy on time 

59 



RECOLLECTIONS 

and pay the balance on Christmas or when 
he sold his hogs. It was the custom of the 
country with the farmers to pay off their 
grocery and store bills once a year, and 
Christmas was considered pay day. 

Some of the Quakers, and others, early 
abolitionists, would not use slave labor 
goods. There was a free labor store at New- 
port where many people traded, and at one 
time Harbor Pierce kept free labor goods at 
Williamsburg — but not exclusively. Uncle 
Benjamin Harris and Uncle Allen Lewis 
for many years thought they used no slave 
labor goods. 

Richmond, when I first saw it, was but a 
small village, something like our present lit- 
tle country towns. There were two dry- 
goods stores. A man by the name of Frost 
kept one, and Brightwell kept the other. I 
think the stores kept and sold groceries and 
hardware, etc. There were two or three tav- 
erns. A man by the name of Baldwin kept 
one of them. There was a hatter lived there 
and made hats for the community. There 
was no saloon. The men who drank could 
get their bitters at the taverns. There was 
60 



RECOLLECTIONS 

no bridge over Whitewater. The large 
Quaker hewed log yearly meeting-house 
stood a little north of town. I recollect go- 
ing with my father to Richmond to hear 
Elias Hicks preach. He stood in a barn 
door and preached. There was a large crowd 
of people to hear him preach. He was a 
Quaker preacher that made a division in the 
Society of Friends — called Hicksites. I can 
not just tell what the difference was. 

XXIV 

Centerville is one of the oldest towns in 
the country, and for a number of years was 
the county seat of Wayne county. When I 
first saw Centerville it was a small village. 
There were two or three dry goods stores. A 
man by the name of Lot Bloomfield, and 
another by name of Abrahams, had stores. 
There were two or three doctors living there. 
One was Dr. Sackett. I don't recollect the 
names of the others. There were two tav- 
erns, a blacksmith shop, two churches, the 
Methodist Episcopal and Baptist Churches. 
The court-house was a log building. The 

61 



RECOLLECTIONS 

county jail was a heavy hewed-log structure. 
There were two or three lawyers living there 
whom I knew — Martin Ray, John Newman 
and James Rairden. There was no mill or 
machinery of any kind in the town. In a 
few years there were a good many eminent 
lawyers living in town. I heard, after I be- 
came a man, O. P. Morton make his first 
Republican speech. It was in the town of 
Centerville. He formerly had been a Demo- 
crat. He was a very brilliant man, a noble 
statesman. And while he was a lawyer, no 
man could gain a case before a jury like 
Morton. He made everybody feel that he 
was surely right, and his client must have 
the verdict. 

XXV 

Washington (now Green's Fork) was one 
among the older towns in the county of 
Wayne. When I first saw the town I was 
ten to twelve years old. There was a grist 
mill, as they were called those days, a saw 
mill, a tan yard, a carding machine and full- 
ing mill, where we got our wool carded and 
our home-made flannel fulled and sheared 
62 



RECOLLECTIONS 

(some of it) and pressed for our winter and 
Sunday clothing. There was a blacksmith 
shop, a shop where they made shoes, a tav- 
ern, a gunsmith shop, a dry goods store, and 
a doctor's office and a schoolhouse. The 
Quaker meeting-house was a little distance 
out of the town. It was rather a nice, pleas- 
ant place and a little business town, situated 
in a very good community. Mother often 
sent me to town, three miles and one-half, on 
"Old Blaze" with a basket of eggs or butter, 
and I would get three cents a dozen for eggs 
and six and one- fourth cents per pound for 
butter in groceries. Paid twenty-five cents 
an ounce for indigo for blueing to blue 
clothes on washday. 

The first election I was ever at was at 
William Johnson's Mill. He laid out the 
town and named it for himself. The only 
fight that I ever saw as long as I have lived 
was at Johnson's Mill on election day. As 
far as I recollect they had whisky to drink. 
As I recollect there was but little if any 
treating till polls were closed and the vote 
counted. Then the men who were elected 
had to treat to the whisky, and they would 



RECOLLECTIONS 

have a jolly good time. My first vote I cast 
when I was but twenty years old. Samuel 
Hannah and John Finley were candidates 
for county clerk. I voted for Sam Hannah. 
John Finley was elected. I had to attend 
court in about one week to tell the court 
whom I voted for. The election was con- 
tested. I was called as a witness to tell how 
I voted. As I stepped away I heard Sam 
Wilson say, "He is old enough." Wilson 
knew me very well. The law was, when I 
cast my first vote, that a voter could vote 
anywhere in his own county. He was not re- 
stricted to his own township where he lived. 
My first vote was given for Sam Hannah at 
Washington, Clay township. I then lived 
in Green township. I was only a little over 
twenty years old and a warm friend of Sam 
Hannah. I was very anxious to vote for my 
candidate. On the day of the election I went 
to the polls and handed in my vote to the in- 
spector, and as I turned away, and that was 
pretty quick, I heard some one ask the in- 
spector, "Is he old enough?" Another said, 
"Oh, yes, I know him." That was true, he 
knew me, but I presume he did not know my 

64 



RECOLLECTIONS 

age. I regret now that I voted before I was 
really entitled to vote. 

XXVI 

I always went to all the weddings that I 
was asked to. There was no place or gather- 
ing of young people that I liked to go to so 
well as to a wedding. I was often called on 
to stand up with the groom. Bridesmaids 
and bridegrooms were all called waiters. 
The waiters were expected to be about as 
well dressed as the groom and bride. When 
I was a young man the bride and her waiter 
wore caps on the day of the marriage and 
also on the day of the infair. The young 
ladies prided themselves on having very fine 
and nice made caps to wear at a wedding. 
Then for some time after she was married 
whenever the young bride put on her wed- 
ding dress or dressed up pretty nice she 
wore her fine cap, too. 

I shall never forget the first Quaker wed- 
ding that I was at. I was the young man's 
waiter. I and the young lady who was the 
bride's waiter were seated just in front of 
65 



RECOLLECTIONS 

the pair. When the time came for them to 
rise to their feet to marry themselves, just 
before he got up, I was to take his hat off 
of his head. Before I thought what I had to 
do he was standing erect on his feet. I was 
very much embarrassed and so was he. I let 
him marry himself with his hat on. Before 
they commenced saying their ceremony in 
marrying themselves we, the waiters, had to 
pull their gloves off before they joined their 
right hands. The bride was not embarrassed. 
She had the glove started or loosened on her 
hand so her waiter could pull it off with ease. 
The groom had on a pair of leather gloves 
of light tan color which fit neat and tight. 
As soon as they arose the waiters were to 
pull the glove off the right hand. We, of 
course, were ready to perform our part. 
The bride's waiter took hold at the end of 
the fingers and off it came. I was still tug- 
ging at the glove at the end of his fingers, 
and I soon saw what I would have to do. I 
took hold of his wrist with my left hand and 
grabbed hold of the glove with my right 
hand, and pulled it off with main strength. 
Some one present said it came off like a pop- 
66 



RECOLLECTIONS 

gun. I failed to hear the last of that for a 
long while. 

XXVII 

On Thursday, the 19th day of September, 
1839, I and Miss Martha Young were mar- 
ried, at the home of her mother, whose first 
husband was Jesse Young. After his death 
she married William Boyd who lived on the 
Walnut level. It was a clear and beautiful 
day. All the young people who were there 
had a very pleasant time. This was the cere- 
mony: 

"We are hereby assembled for the purpose 
of uniting this man and this woman in matri- 
mony. If there is any one present that can 
show any legal cause why they should not be 
united in matrimony let him now speak; if 
not, ever after hold your peace. Join your 
right hands. Branson Lewis Harris, do you 
agree to take Martha Young, whom you 
hold by the right hand, to be your lawful 
and wedded wife in the presence of Al- 
mighty God and the witnesses here assem- 
bled; promise to love and cherish and to 
cleave unto her and her alone, to forsake all 

67 



RECOLLECTIONS 

others until separated by death?" "I do." 
"Martha Young, do you agree to take Bran- 
son Lewis Harris, whom you hold by the 
right hand, to be your lawful wedded hus- 
band, in the presence of Almighty God and 
the witnesses here assembled, promise to love 
and cherish and to cleave unto him and him 
alone, to forsake all others until separated 
by death?" "I do." "By the authority of the 
law of the state of Indiana invested in me, 
I pronounce you husband and wife. Take 
your seats." 

Then we had a nice wedding dinner and 
a pleasant party full of joy and delight. 

Next day, the day of the inf air, soon after 
breakfast, your mother and I and all the 
young people who were going with us to 
my father's to the inf air, mounted our horses 
and away we went. When we got within 
about three-fourths of a mile of father's 
home two young men on horseback met us, 
whom he and mother had sent to meet us with 
a bottle of sweet wine. They called us to a 
halt. The bottle was passed around; then 
they escorted us on to my father's. When 
we got there we got off, tied our horses, and 
walked through the gate and into the house. 

68 



RECOLLECTIONS 

There father and mother met us at the door 
and took my wife and me by the hand and 
welcomed us to their home, and invited us to 
come in and to take seats, and had our hats 
put away. Then all who were present came 
and took us by the hand and congratulated 
us over our happy marriage and wished us a 
long and happy life. We soon were taken 
out to dinner, where all first partook of the 
wine, then sat down to a table well loaded 
with the delicious luxuries of life. When 
dinner was over and the dishes washed and 
put away, the young people spent the bal- 
ance of the day in sport and amusement. 
Our waiters accompanied us to the close of 
the infair. My wife and her waiter wore 
beautiful white dresses and nice caps, orna- 
mentally trimmed with very fine ribbons. I 
was dressed in a suit made of fine blue 
broadcloth ; the cut of the coat was what was 
called close-bodied or "pigeon-tail," trimmed 
with flowered brass buttons plated with 
gold, a silk hat, and a pair of fine kid boots. 
When we went to housekeeping we had 
two beds and bedding, two sets of knives and 
forks, one set of tablespoons, one set of tea- 
cups and saucers and a pitcher, a few bowls, 

69 



RECOLLECTIONS 

a pepper box, and a few dishes. We had 
no cupboard. We had a table and a bureau, 
and a dash churn and a washboard and a 
kettle to heat water in, an oven and a skillet, 
and a stew kettle to hang over the fire to 
boil our meat and cabbage, potatoes, and 
roasting ears, and beans. We had an iron 
tea kettle. We lived in a small low cabin 
eighteen by twenty feet square, stick and 
clay chimney, a clapboard roof, poles for 
joists, and some rough boards laid overhead 
on the joists. The floor was laid down loose, 
not nailed. Doors hung on wooden hinges, 
wooden latch and a six-light glass window. 
An open curbed well in the yard. We drew 
water with a well sweep, a bucket hung to 
the end of a pole. 

We lived contented and happy for more 
than sixty years together. She rests in the 
Quaker graveyard on our farm. And it will 
not be long till I shall be called to lie by her 
side forever. 

I have written down these recollections of 
my boyhood at the solicitation of my sons in 
order to preserve the customs of the early 
pioneers in the neighborhood where I was 
born and have lived for ninety years. 
70 



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